Elizabeth Seton College

Early years Elizabeth Seton College was opened in 1961 by the Sisters of Charity of New York in the Alder Manor, former home of copper magnate William Boyce Thompson. The mansion was purchased by Archdiocese of New York in 1951, and served as a girls' high school for ten years before being upgraded to a junior college. The first class graduated on 9 May 1963. By 1966, the school had grown to the point when it employed 55 persons, including 29 Sisters of Charity, two diocesan priests, and 24 lay employees. In 1973, a group of Sotheby Parke Bernet appraisers were invited to the Seton to examine some paintings in the Alder Manor. Upon entering the mansion they noticed what they recognized as a Medici bowl, one of the earliest works of European porcelain, and made in Florence during the reign of Francesco de Medici. It was soon sold by the college at auction, and fetched a price of $180,000 ($994,500 in 2015 dollars), at the time, the largest price ever paid for European porcelain or any pre-19th century work of art, excluding paintings. but by at least as early as 1973 it was coeducational, and had opened an experimental female dormitory where males were allowed to come in to intermingle. Mary Ellen Brosnan, became President of Seton College in 1975. Her tenure was marked by advances in the college's academic offerings, including new career programs in radio and television and medical laboratory training. Also introduced during her presidency was the LINK, or Leap Into Knowledge program, which gave high school students the opportunity to receive college credits. She also began a policy of awarding credit based on life learning, In 1986, Elizabeth Seton College celebrated its 25th anniversary. Part of the ceremonies included a two-part dinner lecture and tour in the Alder Manor, hosted by Brosnan. Merger with Iona College In early December 1988, it was announced that Elizabeth Seton College would merge with Iona College in time for the next fall semester. The merger was, in the words of Iona President John G. Driscoll, "not a rescue operation, but a marriage." According to a 1989 article by The New York Times, trustees of both colleges had commissioned separate studies by task forces over the two months. However, six years after the merger, in 1995, Iona closed the campus and consolidated operations in New Rochelle. However, some faculty members from the Yonkers campus reported what they believe was a somewhat different reason for the closure. Myra Russel, a longtime associate professor of English at Seton College and later Seton Campus, said that, "they stopped advertising the school completely. They immediately dropped the Seton name and any association with the school." With the merger of Iona and Seton several years earlier, Iona President John Driscoll promised the Sisters they would be able to reside on campus for the rest of their lives. The Sisters of Charity of New York, the congregation which the sisters were a part of, agreed to relocate the sisters to outside residences. The last sisters moved out of the Alder Manor in 1996, and they were the last people living on the campus. List of presidents • Miriam Imelda Kieley, (1961–1966) • Mary Elizabeth Kelly, (1966–1971) • Eileen Farley, (1971–1975) • Mary Ellen Brosnan, (1975–1989) == Academics ==

For a student to make Dean's List, they needed 3.30 out of 4.0 on their GPA. Nursing The college's most successful programs were those of nursing. While other programs at the time were shrinking, Seton's were growing in enrollment, mostly because of their location in four local hospitals, according to Brosnan. She spoke of the program to The New York Times in 1989, saying: Hospitals that are experiencing problems in getting nurses are trying to set up programs to allow staff members – home health aides, secretaries, others – to begin their nursing education, but they want the programs in the hospitals. == Student demographics ==

Seton College was a mostly white institution from its founding through the 1970s. However, starting around 1980, the college began to attract minority students in large numbers. President Brosnan stated that while Seton did not specifically recruit minorities, we went to the schools where there were minorities while seeking students. This trend was accelerated by the opening of the branch campus Manhattan, located in a Catholic high school, which held Friday night and weekend classes for adult students. By 1989, the year the college closed, 59% of students were minorities, and 80% of students in the weekend program were minorities. In 1989, Seton had 980 students, 580 of whom were weekend students, split between the Manhattan and Yonkers campuses. The other 400 were day students at the Yonkers campus, 150 of whom lived on campus. Another 65 students from Mercy College resided on campus due to the college's lack of residence facilities. == Accreditation ==

Elizabeth Seton College was accredited by the Middle States Association of Colleges and Schools on 2 December 1965. == Campuses ==

, the main building of the college. Yonkers The main building and focal point of Elizabeth Seton College's 21-acre campus was Alder Manor, alternatively known as the W. B. Thompson Mansion. It housed administration offices, and many of the ornate and art-filled first floor parlors were used as conference rooms. The upper floors were used for classrooms but mostly as housing for the Sisters of Charity. Several academic buildings, an auditorium, and a residence hall with capacity for 200 students existed near the manor on campus grounds, many of them built in the 1960s and 1970s. In the early 1970s, the women's Lenoir Dormitory was constructed next to the Alder Manor. An experiment for the college, it was the first on campus to allow male and female students to congregate for social purposes. Manhattan In 1980, Seton opened a satellite campus in Manhattan to hold weekend classes for adults. It was not a "campus" in the traditional sense, as it was not owned or used permanently by the college. The 19th-century building was an active Catholic girls' high school, St. Michael Academy, located on West 33rd Street between Ninth and Tenth Avenues. The weekend program turned out to be financially successful, and attracted more minorities to the college enrollment. == Clubs and organizations ==

• Art Club • Drama Club • Elizabethan – student newspaper • Glee Club • Sodality • Student Council • Yearbook – The Chandelle • Young Citizens == Athletics ==

Elizabeth Seton College competed in the now-defunct Northeastern Athletic Conference (not to be confused with the recently created North Eastern Athletic Conference). They competed mostly against other women's colleges in the early years. Varsity athletic programs The following is an incomplete list of men's and women's sports offered at the college. == Notable alumni ==

• Jane Curtin, film and television actor – Class of 1967 • Giancarlo Esposito, film and television actor – Class of 1977 == See also ==